Recently Govenor Bruce Rauner announced his nomination of Rev. James Meeks for Chair of Illinois State Board of Education. The Alliance is disappointed that the Governor has nominated Rev. Meeks to serve in this role because of his pervasive anti-LGBTQ record. This nomination represents a dangerous outlook for LGBTQ students and places all students at risk of unchecked violence and harassment. It ignores the significant anti-bullying work and reforms to prevent school push out, which The Alliance and our partners have made over the last few years.

The Alliance will use its network of GSAs and ally educators to help us reach out to and educate our elected officials on educational justice and fighting to ensure Illinois schools remains safe learning environments for all youth. We will also continue to provide our high quality professional development and LGBTQ youth leadership development work across the state.

For those of you asking how you can help, please consider supporting our work by donating time, money, or other resources to help us further our education work in schools. We also need to remember that he still would need to be confirmed – so contact your legislators and let them know where you stand! We need to get out there and act to ensure our schools remain safe for ALL youth.